Minneapolis fielding proposals for former Kmart site; Nicollet Avenue reconnection set for 2026

This week the City of Minneapolis made what they’re calling an “exciting milestone” in the project to transform the site of the former Kmart along Nicollet Avenue.

Over the last decade, the city has spent more than $20 million in taxpayer dollars securing the land, and now they’re trying to figure out who is going to help them design what will go in the former retailer’s place.

“It has been a really long road,” said Allison Sharkey, executive director of the Lake Street Council.

It’s been a decades long question: Why cut off access to Nicollet Avenue in south Minneapolis with a Kmart?

“The street hasn’t been open for a couple decades now, that was an old planning mistake,” Sharkey said.

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But the city says Nicollet should reopen to traffic by the end of 2026, bringing back a sense of hopefor Sharkey and the rest of the Lake Street community.“The redevelopment and reopening of Nicollet is probably the most important economic development initiative that we’re going to see in this area,” Sharkey said.That’s the first step. This week the city announced it’s accepting proposals from developers for the first phase of the redevelopment of this 10-acre site.“We are at an exciting milestone for the new Nicollet redevelopment project,” said Linnea Graffunder-Bartels, senior project coordinator with Minneapolis Community Planning and Economic Development.Graffunder-Bartels says the plan calls for affordable housing, retail, space for a nonprofit and a location for the Minneapolis Parks and Recreation Board to have programming for the future Nicollet Park.“The soonest we can see construction starting in the phase one site is in three to five years, and a typical construction timeline is about 18 months,” Graffunder-Bartels said. “I understand there’s a lot of excitement for development to happen on this site and this milestone is the key next step in seeing something built here, and while there’s things that can happen out of our control during that development planning process, we’re moving forward as quickly as we can.”

“These are multi-million dollar projects, and so it may take a while,” Sharkey said.

For the planning portion so far, the city has invested $175,000 in this project, along with $75,000 in grant money. Sharkey understands while securing financing for this scale of a project is tricky, she believes it’s crucial to keep pushing forward.

“We have this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to redo the infrastructure in our neighborhood in a big way,” Sharkey said.

The design proposals are due Jan. 6, and there will be time for the public to weigh in on the options sometime next year.

For more information on the project or to submit a proposal, click here.

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